“The award-winning architect, Renzo Piano, has withdrawn his design for City Gate.” This obituary notice was relegated to the back page of the business supplement of The Times of 29 December.

Urban Development and Roads Minister, Jesmond Mugliett said that the government was willing to give the Piano proposal another chance, but he felt he could not take the project at this point in time. He was probably not too happy with the chain of events in Malta in the past.

The Piano project, unveiled in the early 1980s, enthused a few, particularly those who cashed in at the launching stage. But it dismayed many more, including Din L-Art Helwa. In spite of what Mr Mugliett has just been saying, the government had forgotten all about the Piano project by the year 2000.

2001 project

Early in the year 200l, the government embarked on a Lm40 million project for the development of City Gate. Two consortia, chaired by Albert Mizzi and architect Joe Cassar respectively, submitted tender documents at the time.

The project envisaged the construction of the bus terminus outside City Gate, a National Centre for the Arts on the site of the former Royal Opera House, above and below ground development of Freedom Square, an underground, multi-storey car park, and the rehabilitation of St James Ditch.

That, too, was relegated to limbo. Last year, Mr Mugliett was speaking in terms of converting the opera house site for other purposes. He envisaged a House of Parliament, with state-of-the-art amenities.

New House of Parliament

Like all its predecessors, this “project” is in the laps of the gods. Mr Mugliett is now thinking of “probably having to go back to square one” and that, this time, the Opera House site and City Gate, would be handled separately.

His order of priorities seems to be: first the Opera House project – if approved – and then moving on to “a separate scheme for City Gate and Freedom Square, including the bus terminus, which could be the object of a competition”.

It looks as if the menu for the next elections is under preparation. A new comprehensive project will be duly brandished by the media, and dangled like a carrot before what is still left of the credulous electorate.

Meanwhile, Valletta languishes like an abandoned bride. The City entrance, which is visited annually by a million tourists, let alone most of Malta’s population, continues to look like the Bazaar of Baghdad at the time of Haroun al Rashid!

It is a sad story that belittles Valletta’s dignity, and is an affront to our national pride. More than that, it is a story of neglect of a world heritage site. Who is accountable?

Ingrained initiative

In many respects, it is a story of ingrained inertia replicated all over these islands.

Public opinion seems to have become inured to the neglect of our rich historical heritage. It is even more insensitive to official inertia and incompetence – all of which drains our scarce resources.

Why isn’t public opinion up in arms at the sight of Malta’s biggest, unfinished white elephant – namely the Mater Dei Hospital – which seems to be taking longer to build than the Pyramids, and which has become another national embarrassment?

Why is the Lm10 million Cirkewwa/ Mgarr project, initially taken in hand in 1999 for completion early in 2004, still at its half-way stage (after having been scaled down)?

Whatever happened to the big talk about the Lm14 million White Rocks project, trumpeted so loudly by the Tourism Minister in May 200l, and why has the site for that project been allowed to go to the dogs ever since?

Why has the Fort Chambray project in Gozo been allowed to develop into a shaggy-dog story?

Why has it taken so long to reach the half-way point on the project to pave the streets of Mdina?

And, turning once more to Valletta, what does it profit the City to have a so-called “Valletta Rehabilitation Committee”, when Fort St Elmo, which is a jewel that should enrich our patrimony, is going to rack and ruin, without as much as a resignation in protest against what appears to be official paralysis?

There can be no resurgence for Valletta, and for Malta, for that matter, unless a new, can-do generation, with a sense of national pride and a will to work, takes over.

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